“This country's hard on people, you can't stop what's coming, it ain't all waiting on you. That’s vanity.” - Ellis (Barry Corbin) in “No Country for Old Men” (2007)

With each passing minute of our lives, our hearts and minds try to reconcile.
The mind teeters back and forth deciding whether we stand a chance or not. Sometimes it waves a white flag. At other times, it stops at nothing to pursue opportunity.
Even if it’s raped by confusion and battered with exhaustion, our brains can still make it a point to remind us that the sun has to shine after every storm. Our minds can either make us or break us. Only we hold the liberty of making that choice.
Sadly, this train of cognitive liberty derails on the tracks of destiny. Fate that only the heart knows. At the same time, while our minds are searching for that silver lining, our hearts remind us to embrace the present storm. Our hearts protect us from the superstitions of luck and coincidence.
Most importantly, our hearts subtly remind us that you just can't stop what's coming.
My mind has certainly played tricks on me throughout the course of writing this - making me think the points were too difficult to conceptualize, and the ideas would be reduced to nothing more than a mere oversimplification of some idealist hippy. Those thoughts were short-lived though because, after all, the choice to stand or fall was ultimately mine.
With that being said, I mentally did my part. The rest is up to fate.
As people get older, they learn to lead with their hearts when making choices. It’s like a biological GPS that you can always count on to find your way. Always follow your heart. If you know how to communicate with it correctly, you'll always get positive feedback.
Communication begins with the heart dialing out first. Unfortunately for most people, the brain never picks up. However, not answering the call is the second worst thing you can possibly do. The worst crime a human being can ever commit lies in reversing this process by letting the mind call the shots.
Don't fall into promoting the conscious mind to the body's highest pay grade. It won't pay off. It never does. Instead of supervising intuition, the brain should be on standby, ready to decode it.
Currently, my mind is honestly trying to figure out why I feel like this world is falling apart so fast.
So far, I've done my best to satisfy this hunch. I'm almost totally convinced about why and how the sky is falling. The big question is when. When does this all get out of control?
When does our day of reckoning come for turning on nature?
Obviously, no one knows the time or day, but there will be one major clue hinting the end of our times. This clue involves the formation of an über political unit, or something along the lines of a widely conspired new world order.

What's that? You think I'm kidding, or just batshit crazy?

Let me explain…

A unified planet is the perfect preceding for the end.
This idea goes beyond any biblical prophecy or doomsayer's apocryphalness. This idea stems from a logical observation of life. You see, life starts and ends with the same biological characteristic - limits.
In the beginning, life is confined or limited. It needs to be cradled and nurtured before it's ready to break away and stand on its own. Although growth and development seem boundless, life gradually returns to where it came from towards the end. When the clock ticks down, life revisits an all-too-familiar restricted or limited state, which requires care and support once again. The need for support arises from the inability to properly sustain oneself due to increasing limitations.
Logically, this planet should hit a natural ceiling, if it didn’t already. Remember, this world started as one colossal (and scientifically accepted) supercontinent, Pangaea. We must return to these roots in some way before the end. Count on us drawing back together to create a natural crutch before this Earth deserts the universe for good. So far, a one world government appears to be the bureaucratically ill-chosen, but predictable answer to a collectively struggling world - a world that is getting progressively limited just like any other old, aging organism.
Could there be a given time frame for this occurrence? When will the world irreparably turn upside down? As of this very moment, I'm unofficially predicting the final "big change" to occur in October 2010.
Why October 2010?

Well, first off, I'll start by explaining my sophisticated researching technique - I googled "apocalypse." For the most part, the results returned the most anticipated date in history; 2012.
December 21st to be exact.
Apparently, the ancient Maya civilization developed a calendar system that ends on that date. Regardless of the specific intricacies, the calendar stood the test of time, and proved to be more accurate than our Gregorian calendar. I love the idea of this calendar, and what it entails. It only needs to be adjusted by one day in 380,000 years! I feel compelled to believe in it.

Similar to the Maya, a recent claim was made by a man named Terence McKenna, who also discovered an end date of 2012 through the use of a great book called the I Ching. The I Ching is an ancient Chinese text that's like a "pocket universe." Not only does it provide the framework for the simplicity of nature, but it also describes every change and transformation through the use of 64 different hexagrams. (By the way, my recommendation for a copy of this book parallels any proposal for a primary reinforcer, like food or air. If you don't have it, you need it.)

So, this dude, McKenna, utilized all sixty four hexagrams of the I Ching to graph a timeline. This timeline, according to McKenna, graphed novelty (or change) over time. (You can literally try it out for yourself by using Time Wave Zero software. Just google it.)

According to actual Timewave Zero software, which produces McKenna's graph of novelty over time, the last peak on the graph before the dive into infinity will occur in October 2010. The last peak occurred in November 2008 when the U.S. presidential elections sent shock waves around the world.

2010.83 is a bold prediction for sure. I find the idea quite fascinating. I can't wait to find out what's going to happen.
Of course, I could be way off because my ideas aren't driven by prophetic visions, or some godly apparition that visits during the night slipping me cosmic cheat sheets. My ideas are driven purely by intuition, and I’m just riding shotgun.

“The funny thing is - on the outside, I was an honest man, straight as an arrow. I had to come to prison to be a crook.” - Andy Dufresne (Tim Robbins) in “The Shawshank Redemption” (1994)

Failing to find scatological humor funny anymore was just the preamble to my nightmare year. The New York Yankee dynasty fell along with the Twin Towers, and the times of freedom, celebration, and absentmindedness fell along with it. I experienced these nauseating loses first hand as a sophomore at my northeastern high school.
This world is brutal, and I have the year 2001 A.D. to thank for waking me up to it. Along with the rest of America, I'm sure that I aged 5 years for every year after 2001.
Walking into school every day was similar to Brooks Hatlen leaving Shawshank. I just couldn't believe what the hell happened to everything. The world went and got itself in a big damn hurry.
Every morning I thought about chiseling my name in my bedroom wall, and then hanging myself from the ceiling fan.
Security guards were everywhere. Uniforms were implemented. All of the fun stuff that raised spirits, and brought kids closer to school were unjustly axed. The party was over. Those feel good, heartfelt times were over.
I was living in a world that didn't have time for recess anymore.
Whether it was at school, home, or the workplace, I’m sure that this feeling was shared by almost every American everywhere to some extent.
High school pre-2001 showed too much promise. It was way too good to be true.
People just let the good times roll. There were plenty of fun activities and events that legitimately kept students engaged in school, and even though most of the teachers were old, they were certainly seasoned. They knew how to reach out to kids in their own weird ways. Some had well-known internet screen names while others disregarded text books in order to avoid deceptive or biased information.
These old ways were fading, and young, fresh minds at both ends of the student/teacher spectrum were dawning an entirely new age.
Post-2001 America was undoubtedly changing, and I followed suit. My gilded world continued to suffer from blows to its’ candy-coated armor.
Not only did my concept of poo go from LOL to OMG by turning into bacterial infested fecal matter, but my concept of school transformed into an old, cookie cutter, sober institution of learning.
Sharing the pain similar to that of Brooks Hatlen and Andy Dufresne, it was tough to take on the unfamiliar scope of new territory.
Instead of breaking down like Brooks, I became petrified like Andy. I decided against letting the newly implemented rules and security guards get the best of me. I lied, cheated, manipulated, and stole my way to a premature release. Flawless in my execution, I only got better. It was strictly about getting ahead, and beefing up my stats. What mattered was only on paper. This was the cruelest lesson handed down from the latest batch of educators.
I just failed to see the young, inexperienced teachers as bright and dedicated. They were noobies. I saw them as particularly cold and anal.
I will admit that I didn't fully understand them until I graduated college. I quickly forgave them after experiencing several different schools, where I witnessed firsthand the flaw that collegiate mentors passed down from class to class. It was a weakness that came with every teaching certificate; quantity over quality.
Quantitative work is the hallmark of every college in America.
Colleges breed workaholics. The value of your academic worth only comes down to how much you accomplish. Nobody kills more trees than the typical 21st century teacher. They absolutely love quizzes, tests, homework assignments, activities, essays, worksheets, projects, research papers, and everything in between.
It’s a competition that plays similarly to baseball. It’s really only a game of discretionary numbers.
It’s outdated in my opinion. We are still stuck in a time where the content of human character plays second fiddle to social constructs. Instead of caste and color, it’s the number of gold stars that determines your value. Congratulations, us.
If it wasn't for the few teachers who actually portrayed sincere human qualities, and cared about something other than grades, I probably would've been a complete nightmare to society. I was very fortunate enough to abort my assiduous, cold-hearted ways. I was able to relax, and see more to school and life.
I would really like to thank a small handful of professors for teaching me things worth learning like how to be genuine, patient, and flexible.

“It's just murder. All God's creatures do it. You look in the forests and you see species killing other species, our species killing all species including the forests, and we just call it industry, not murder.” - - Woody Harrelson (Mickey Knox) in “Natural Born Killers” (1994)

Personally, I've hypothesized that discontent leads to plagiarism.
Discontent leads to the replication and exploitation of each natural element in every way, shape, and form. If you look closely enough, you’ll find that we are deeply unsatisfied with nature.
Observe the world around you. Look at the things that make up your surrounding environment.
Notice anything?
We actually owe ALOT more to nature than one thinks.
For example, when the Wright Brothers received their award for the airplane, the acceptance speech should've started out with something along the lines of, "Well, first off, I'd like to thank, umm… every wild animal that flies and glides."
Come on guys, like the dude who invented the train didn't have a thing for snakes either? And Mr. Ford, tell me, why is the most popular term of measurement for power named after a horse?
The list goes on and on.
Every single thing produced by man has been created before. The ideas of today act as mere shadows of former designs. Only nature should be awarded for ingenuity, not man.
Nature is much like one my favorite comic book heroes, the Incredible Hulk. They both possess shades of green, and you absolutely can not afford to disturb them because they can turn on you instantly. At the same rate, nature's forgery is much like the Hulk's recurring nemesis, the Abomination.
This classic match up immaculately represents our current climate. Like nature, the Hulk was created through a catastrophic accident of extraordinary proportions. Afterwards, he finds out that his existence prompts an antonymous force, the Abomination, to crave his awesome power. This antonymous force works to deliberately imitate the Hulk in a fruitless attempt to transcend him.

Modern conveniences epitomize our attempts to pirate nature in order to superficially transcend it.
For instance, glasses, contacts, cameras, and telescopes outmatch sight, computers outdo mind, and TiVo outshines memory. These innovations may seem very helpful and powerful, but c’mon, even the Abomination displayed twice the strength as his green counterpart. But this strength is blind to say the least. In the end, it's like chasing a rainbow.
The most copied aspect of nature is probably the name itself.
Walk down any isle in a grocery store, and you're sure to find a plethora of products with the words 'All Natural' riddled all over them. It seems to be the universal tagline for everything with a barcode. If you paid any attention at all up to this point, I shouldn't even have to explain this (2nd all-time) paradox. This 'All Natural' endeavor makes no sense at all. False advertising is a crime, but it's even more criminal to have one of the most revered words in the human vocabulary misrepresented like this.
It's like stamping 'All Natural' on some nasty, worn street whore.
Car companies are included in this crime as well. From now on, all you're going to see are advertisements for the cleanest, greenest, and most environmentally safe vehicles on the road. Saying that cars can help the environment is like saying AIDS can help immune systems. As long as the unnatural idea of a car exists in the natural environment, it will ALWAYS hurt a million times more than it will help. Cars can be bulleted on the same list as most consumer products, and I really don't even need a good argument against consuming. It just sucks anymore.
I feel so fucking nauseous when I'm so full and immobile after eating a huge dinner, while watching a hot dog eating contest that's followed by a 'feed these children' commercial. But, you know what really makes me sick? Seeing never-ending piles of shit littered everywhere.
Is it just me? Or does more and more shit get illegally dumped all over the place?
If Adam and Eve taught us anything, it's that there’s an A and E in all of us. We are all human. The propensity to be senseless is completely inherent. So, collectively, how stupid are we to trust people with all of this damn shit?

Who let the world get like this?

The worst part is that it's not going anywhere. We've collected so much junk throughout the years thanks to assembly lines and robots.
Where's it all going to go?
The Pacific Ocean?
Naples?
Your backyard?
Or how about my backyard? Ooops, too late. Waste Management or Umbrella, as I like to call them, is already in my fucking backyard. Thanks fer yer trash ya'll!
It's all SHIT.
And believe me when I tell you that shit is something to be taken very seriously.
I learned that in the summer of 2001 at fifteen years old when I was dared to hit a car with a bag full of our present topic.
Now, I know what you’re asking yourself right now, and the answer is:
"Yes, my mom was very proud."
Please, give me a chance to explain my bizarre adolescent behavior.
You see, once my friends and I reached our teens, we discovered that striking cars with random objects at night was thee ultimate high. Whether we actually hurled something at a car, or faked it, like the little bastards we were, the intent was to get chased around the neighborhood by outraged drivers. When the car came to a screeching halt, the reverse lights lit up along with our heart rates.
Only looking for the most lucrative situations, we only targeted newly licensed drivers, whose sound systems cost more than the car itself, and rich folks who stopped at nothing to avoid letting poor dirtbags like us get the best of them. Both demographics put up one hell of a fight.
It was a tradition, and our idea of insane fun.
My friends and I liked being chased so much that we even went as far as being run down by fireworks on slow nights when the human pursuits failed. Seriously...Every so often about ten of us collected a bunch of bottle rockets, and took them over to our high school parking lot. There, we would snap off the superfluous wooden tails of each rocket leaving just the explosive and the connecting wick. Standing together in a tight circle, one person would be designated to light a rigged rocket and fling it in the air. The rocket hit its’ apex and started descending, which marked our universal cue to run like hell. The unwritten law of “running like hell” never changed either - no one ever looked back.
As soon as I had the hair singed off the back of my legs, I stopped participating, needless to say. Yep, like most people, I stopped once I got caught.
So, as I valiantly noted before, the moment that ended my career of car terrorism involved a fresh, steaming bag of doggy doo that sat at the bottom of a plastic grocery bag. I ended up with that bag for the same reasons you only offer that extra piece of cake to the fat kid. It was a sure way to get rid of it. Besides, my inner Marty McFly never responded favorably after being called a chicken...or pussy. By the way, can you imagine if Biff actually called Marty a pussy?? Ha.

Anyways, back to the past...

...I waited on the side of the road crouched next to a bush with the bag to my side safely stretched away from my body. I gripped the bag like the hammer that contestants use at one of those “test your strength” games. When the very next car drove by, I picked the bag up over my head and swung it downward with Herculean force. The bag exploded off of the back windshield on impact, and I instantaneously dove backwards to dodge the brief drizzle of poo shrapnel.
The remains of the busted bag didn’t even get a chance to flutter down onto the pavement before I heard an overly frightened voice shriek, "Oh my God! That's my mom!"
Indeed, I just hit my best friend's brand new Sonata with smelly canine excrement. Congratulations, me.
To make a short story even shorter, that night ended with my best friend cracking under the pressure from his parents and Johnny Law. I couldn’t believe that I was ratted out the same night. I’ll never know exactly how he folded, but I like to think my best friend wouldn’t just give me up that easily.
Regardless, there were never any hard feelings. I just finally understood how Lefty Guns felt when he discovered Donnie’s true identity as an FBI agent. From the bad guy's perspective, I understood that it was my fault for putting the both of us in that situation. It was my best friend, so if it had to be anyone, I guess I'm glad it was him.
Forget about it.
Honestly, the worst part of that night was walking up to my doorstep with the lousy cop who picked me up. Like most upstanding local law enforcers, he was solely interested in prosecuting a defenseless juvenile with no prior record to the fullest extent of the law.
I eventually found out there was a very good explanation for the officer’s incomprehensible cruelty. Apparently, the object I decided to displace all over the back end of my friend's car that night was more lethal than I initially thought.
I thought it was only poop. I thought it was only a harmless prank. I thought it wouldn’t be long before I started putting it into bags and lighting it on fire again.
I thought wrong.
The dog's fecal matter happened to raise some serious health risks. If it got into a facial orifice and caused anyone to fall ill, I was probably going to need a good lawyer. Thankfully, no one was hurt, and all charges against me were dropped.
I’ll never forget that night though - the night I realized that shit wasn't so humorous and benign anymore.
The comical façade of poop virtually disappeared!
My little world was rocked.
I couldn’t believe it.
It really wasn’t a laughing matter.
That just goes to show you - in this world, no one is impervious to shit. No one likes to take it or deal with it. We also can't ignore the fact that it needs to be disposed of properly. If you ever think shit isn't a big deal, you'll be knee deep in it.
Well, we are knee deep in it, and it’s about to hit the proverbial fan thanks to a heinously bad group efficacy.
We all need to change the way we think about shit, and start seeing it for what it really is. Once we embrace that concept, I think we can be well on our way to turning things around.

"I’d hate to wake up some morning and find out that you weren’t you" - Dr. Miles Bennell (Kevin McCarthy) in “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” (1956)

In case you’ve just tuned in, here’s a quick recap of what has been discussed so far:
A logical understanding of the laws of our environment is crucial for adapting. For living things, adaptation depends on the understanding of nature. Acting in accord with nature guarantees the survival of that element.
In my own words, I used “walls” to explain our current discord with our environment.
Our actions towards these walls represent something more than just a primordial drive to change things. It depicts, in my opinion, the most horrifying aspect of human nature; discontent.
Most of the civilized human population struggles with this presumption. Most of us find no problem in taking aberrant avenues to manipulate nature, and mold it into our darkest desires.
As a result, most of us fail to accept things for what they truly are.
Postmodern society breeds discontent. Technology has cradled the idea for eons. It only inhibits nature, and exploits its’ elements.
This causes a great deal of confusion because people can't even differentiate between what’s right and wrong anymore.
Who can't tell the difference, you ask?
Look no further than the people who treat their bodies like cars. Need a new front or back end? No problem. Honestly, besides some blood and oil stains, there’s really no difference between Dr. 90210 and some grease monkey at your local body shop. The imaginary line separating what’s natural and unnatural blurs too much consequently creating a lapse in moral judgment. This human error unquestionably brings us to a world that’s coming closer and closer to breaking every last natural law.

Yikes.
If you're not convinced after looking at Joan Rivers, maybe you should visit some area hospitals. I tend to rub my friends and family the wrong way with my logic, but I think that this remains the world's leading, all-time paradox.
As you would expect, human beings are inclined to choose life over death. Unfortunately, this decision bears a lavish price tag, a trade-off, where people (mostly in the western world) are living unnaturally rather than dying naturally. Synthetic drugs? Surgery? Are we the living dead? Should pharmacies start prescribing brains instead of anti-depressants?


Send more paramedics!

All kidding aside, not only is this an extremely sensitive subject, but it's also a huge moral complexity. I only feel okay about touching on it because I am an organ donor afterall, and I'll say it again - we are all naturally inclined to choose life over death. We will do pretty much anything to sustain life. Who doesn't want to help people live??

Ugh, let's switch gears. Shall we?

Undoubtedly, I believe that the most fascinating manifestation of discontent in the human consciousness is the idea of extraterrestrials.
Here me out on this one.
I think our general dissatisfaction evolved to a level where we are even tired of seeing the same old group of stupid humans all the time.
Familiarity breeds contempt, huh?

We boring humans are so fucking played out, so it looks like maybe we’ve created other life forms to spice things up a bit (a la vampires).

I fail to believe in the idea of aliens for a few reasons. The first reason lies in undetermined and hoaxed photographs of UFOs over time. These pictures show us an evolution of design, which draws a seemingly large parallel to the big hunks of metal down on the ground - automobiles.
At first glance, earlier automobiles show bland designs of simple contours and rounded edges, like one of Al Capone’s getaway Cadillacs. Later models noticeably demonstrate more complicated designs, sharper edges, and highly developed features. In comparison, the older representations of UFOs all seemed to have the appearance of a clever, little, Frisbee-like saucer with the half-spherical-shaped, windowed dome on the top for that little alien to navigate. Now, we get the privilege of seeing more tricked out, Close Encounters of the Third Kind-like spaceships on a much larger scale with more advanced accessories like colors and flashing lights. In our minds, aliens appear to progress at the same rate as Toyota.
That’s all besides the fact because, afterall, aren’t aliens referred to as other life forms?
With the emphasis here on our keyword, life, I just don't see living organisms going against the grain of their habitat. Technology is unnatural, and it’s implausible to think that it could ever advance to that point.
Like I said before, people are under the false assumption that the future is going to look like a bizarre sci-fi movie with nothing but big metal structures with lots of neon lights, cyborgs, and fancy buttons that control the most sophisticated gadgets.
By law, that SHOULD NOT happen to living organisms. That stuff wasn’t on Earth when we got here, so it really doesn’t belong here. Our world or any other world that breeds so-called “life forms” of any kind will never ever, ever progress to that point.
Maybe if one lived in anti-nature or unnature, but living in a dead world presents a rather large obstacle. Wouldn’t you agree?

“…it's easier to lose yourself in drugs than it is to cope with life. It's easier to steal what you want than it is to earn it. It's easier to beat a child than it is to raise it. Hell, love costs: it takes effort and work.” - Detective Lt. William Somerset (Morgan Freeman) in “Se7en” (1995)

Charles Darwin determined that living organisms have only two choices in their innate environment: adapt or die.
Superior beings adapt. Naturally, unfit organisms fail to make it to the next link in the chain of life. This was, by far, the easiest concept to remember in science class.
Today, there seems to be an issue with this idea. This issue lies in a fundamental misconception of the rule that Darwin provided for all of us.
Our society has such a simple notion so assbackwards that it’s more disconcerting than American remakes of Japanese horror films.
Now, to help interpret the cornerstone of Darwinian law, I present exhibit A: The Wall Theory.
(Rest assured. Pink Floyd has nothing to do with this; mostly because I know practically nothing about music, hence the reason for using obscure movie analogies.)
The Wall Theory just corrects the common misconceptions of Darwin’s scientific findings. The “wall” is a mere metaphorical reference for any obstacle we face in our tangible environment, and how we attempt to hurdle it.
Throughout history, human beings have fostered a progressive obsession with tearing down walls. The walls portray man’s aggression and tenacity. It’s how we handle life’s ongoing struggles.
For example, modern luxuries have helped us all deal with life's walls. When it gets too cold, we can turn up the heat. When it gets too hot, we can switch on the central air.
Even though I’ve loved and praised gas and refrigerants over many years, I’m just now failing to see the logic in it. In reality, we are not adapting to our environment. We are actually making our environment adapt to us!
Remember what it really took to adapt? Things like walking upright or increasing cranial capacities?
When did impatience supersede mankind's loyalty to nature?
I guess naturally adapting to walls takes too much damn effort and work.
It’s much quicker and more efficient to tear down walls and build them back up again at our discretion, but, doesn’t this process make the walls adapting? So, according to Darwin, if we as human beings are not adapting anymore, what does that make us?
Yep, you got it.
But more people wake up on this planet than die, and the reason is very obvious. This place just wouldn't be called nature anymore if dying became more ordinary than living.
Due to the straightforward laws of our environment, we must choose life at all costs. We must strive to adapt. No human being wants to subsist in anti-nature, right?

(Spoiler Alert: More obscure movie analogies!)

Nothing portrays the wall theory better than the opening sequence of one of the greatest early 90’s flicks, The Last Boy Scout. Being one of the most awesome introductions in the history of cinema, this one haunts you like a bad dream. Fitness guru Billy Blanks plays the role of a desperate football player who starts the most unconventional shooting spree in history by yanking a handgun out of his uniform en route to the end zone. I wish Madden games had this option. Why can't they replace the spin button with something like that? C'mon EA. Next season, let's evade would-be tacklers by shooting them, no?
ANYWAYS, I consider this the perfect allegory. Frame by frame, there’s a poetic struggle in Blank's character that currently exists in all of us – the struggle to adapt.
For different reasons, this is exactly how we’ve been scoring all of our touchdowns lately - meaning that more and more human beings are settling for unnatural means to their own ends. We are all vigilantes, taking the law into our own hands.
Whether the answer to your wall is a drug that bends it, a steroid that defies it, or a firearm that disputes it, it’s one in the same. Once you cross the goal line, you’ll most likely end up on one knee, heat to your head, embarking the inevitable.

Switching gears a bit, I've discovered that in the midst of arguing for nature’s laws, a similar plea for adapting to the terms of the universe presents itself. Again, grabbing a dictionary and taking the definition verbatim yields the best defense.
Again, sadly, common sense falls unusually short of convincing most people of the truth.
The real meaning of this word lies behind its numerical prefix. I've never seen the term "biverse" used before in any scholarly text. Have you?
Am I the only person scratching my head here? It seems logical to combine the concepts of nature with the concepts of the place in which it resides in.
Why aren't we doing everything in our power to live life naturally and universally?

It's sounds so vague and difficult to apply, but it's really not.
Just take a step back, and try to look at the big picture - like you're on the outside looking in.

Let's try an exercise this part of the brain right now... For instance, what's the worst aspect of a war? Collateral damage? Economic repercussions? The fact that it's purely unethical, and outright ridiculous to build a foundation of peace through the use of violence?

Without going on and on, how about summing it all up by simply saying that war breaks the law.

What else do you need to hear?

War is the most reckless response to any wall. Naturally, we can't afford to choose death over life. Universally, that decision affects everyone no matter what side you're on.

“Stop breaking the law, asshole!” - Fletcher Reede (Jim Carrey) in “Liar Liar” (1997)

Laws are great. Laws teach us how to effectively adapt to our environment. Adaptation leads us to freedom. Failure to adapt leads to the loss of freedom. Laws truly are that simple.
These laws condition people to endure their existence.
It's the first rule of survival: learn fast or get left behind real quick. You need to gain an understanding of the environment around you, and assess the fundamental principles of your habitat.
So now, for example, I'm an American living Northeast Pennsylvania. With that being said, I can safely scratch ‘red-light district’ and ‘hemp shops’ off the list of ideas for new tourist attractions likely to arrive here in Scranton.

*sighing*

Adjusting our judgment and behavior according to the laws of our environment ensures survival.

But first thing's first.

Before we can adjust, we must be able to identify where the hell we are. So... what is this place?

Where do we all really live?

It's completely asinine to consider arbitrary things, like geopolitical lines or street names, as being reasonable addresses.

All of those names and numbers only serve as props on mother nature's grand stage.
Yes, I said nature.
I repeat, nature.
We all seem to forget our universal address. Nature is more ubiquitous than religious intolerance AND Hannah Montana. Seriously.

So...since nature is our said environment, wouldn't it make sense to adjust our behavior according to natural law?



Webster's Dictionary defines natural as:

marked by easy simplicity and freedom from artificiality, affectation, or constraint (adj.)
one born without the usual powers of reason and understanding (n.)

History has bestowed us with several different theories of natural law, and I'm willingly providing an additional thought to the list.
The knowledge of a philosopher or even a lawyer, doctor, or scientist, for that matter, is not required to grasp this concept. The idea is self-explanatory; picking up a dictionary to brush up on your vocabulary works just fine.
For instance, criminal law identifies crimes and punishments, and by the same token, contract law deals with exchanging and keeping promises. Natural law, in turn, defines the uncivilized, unaffected, and uncultivated elements of the world.
It refers to the simple state of life that remains totally void of our modern distractions.

We live in an incredibly unnatural world, and we are paying a huge fucking price for it. Just stop and think for a couple seconds, and ask yourself:
“What happens if I live against nature?”

Well, what happens if you decide to live against the United States?
These are universal questions with universal answers.

Sounds pretty straight forward, right? It's the easiest concept in the world, yet we all suck at truly comprehending it.

For example, after a presentation on contraceptives, our guest speaker, an esteemed college professor, shared a few theories behind why some women choose not to take birth control. She said that one of the main reasons some women opt not to take the pill is because it’s not natural. She immediately followed that statement with, “…but it all depends on what your definition of natural is.”
According to ol' Ms. Prophylactic, there are several interpretations of what could be considered natural. Ingesting pills today may be something normal, but to say that it could be considered natural is just fucking stupid.
Sorry, it’s NOT natural, and there’s only ONE definition of it.


In case you're still confused, stoned, or both, I’m only trying to use the definition of nature in order to draw rational conclusions. Not only will these conclusions help to identify and explain problems, but they will also help resolve them.

This shit is important.

If we're not living our lives naturally, we're not living at all.
I think we are actually devolving, straying further and further away from nature. To the point where watching a television show or movie is almost impossible without seeing a dream sequence where someone imagines what the world will look like in 30 years, and, of course, it usually involves some Star Trek or Blade Runner-esque vision. A vision usually void of green, where the old, blue sky of the past falls behind an infinitely black or red planetary canopy that hangs over some synthetic, urban society.
So, yeah, television and brilliant role models, such as the aforementioned professor, do not make things easy for us.
With that being said, marching in to society's postmodern courtroom with a Stoic approach is no psychological stroll through the fucking park. I believe that the monumental task at hand coincides with the major problems facing our world today.
Using common sense as precedent, I’ll address these problems in order to convince you, the jury, to rule on restoring the balance.

Forward

For almost two years, I scribbled some of my most obscure thoughts in a notebook, which I referred to as my 'creative outlet' (a manly euphemism for 'diary'). I jotted something down whenever I thought outside-the-box. Usually, this sort of thinking occurs when one is sedated (a Ramones euphemism for 'fucked up'), however, my ability to explore and archive these thoughts arrived through total sobriety.
I tried to keep it simple. I tried. But, like everyone else, I increasingly felt the need to explore a topic I still don't quite understand – life.
So what do I think about life? Well, reality, as my parents like to call it, is a tasteless joke. Reality is about as real as porn, and why watch porn when you can have sex? That's what I think was exposed in the following essays. I can't believe the way I look at things now.

I know everyone has their own impression. What you are about to read is just another one.
I won't tell you the glass is half empty or half full, however, I will tell you that every interpretation in the world made about that glass does not change the contents of it; one glass, one static substance, and somehow several different stories about it.
Well, ironically, this is just another way to evaluate that glass [an evaluation of evaluations]. I'm not trying to be persuasive or misleading. Really, I'm not. I know that Quantum Psyhicists say that there's no such thing as an objective observer, but I'm going to give it a go. I'm thinking in terms of being on the outside looking in. The following essays are frank and honest, and act only as food for thought.
I’d just like to offer the world another point of view.
My diary, wait… I mean my personal creative outlet contained my unsystematic thoughts and theoretical observations, and fully matured at seven pages (front and back) in length. These pages were paginated and deciphered to tell a story the only way I know how to tell it. The seventh page marked the point when I stopped talking to the notebook. I decided that I wanted to talk to others.
So, let's chat...